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Abstract

The ever-increasing number and variety of mobile devices allow users to access information and online applications from remote locations. The Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) is taking advantage of these technologies to build a Computer-Assisted Data Collection (CADC) instrument for the Consumer Price Index (CPI). For the survey, BLS employees visit a total of 25,000 businesses each month to collect price information on approximately 85,000 items. Currently, they collect all the data on paper. In developing the instrument, we are following a user-centered design approach, which has enabled us to find and fix many usability problems early in development. We faced a variety of usability challenges, especially in designing the instrument to fit on the pen computer display. This paper describes some of the lessons we learned in converting our paper survey to CADC.

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Designing a Pen-Based Data Collection Application for the Consumer Price Index: Lessons Learned 1

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References